In a packet processing system packets are buffered into queues until the queue is full. When the queue is full a subsequently received packet is dropped because no space is available to store the subsequently received packet. If the queue is consistently full, the network will become congested because subsequently received packets will not be transmitted. This phenomenon is referred to as “tail drop” and causes an inefficient distribution of queue space among packets in a flow. Random Early Detection (RED) packet dropping based on average queue depth has been implemented to address this inefficient distribution of queue space among packets in a flow. Improved methods of Random Early Detection (RED) packet dropping may further improve performance of packet processing systems.